


Truth-Teller

by LadyRhiyana



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Honour vs. Reality of Life in Westeros, Moral Ambiguity, Tywin Lannister & the Socratic Method, Tywin Lannister's A+ Parenting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-16
Updated: 2019-03-16
Packaged: 2019-11-19 01:02:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18128912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyRhiyana/pseuds/LadyRhiyana
Summary: Jaime Lannister was born with the mark of a truth-teller on his left hand.He knows, always, when a man is lying or shading the truth. More than a learned skill and practiced instinct, it’s his gift; falsehood tastes foul and bitter on his tongue.**It’s a dangerous, dangerous gift.Men have lived and died on a truth-teller’s word. Lords have risen and been torn down.Even kings have fallen.





	1. Jaime

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this particular AU in the back of my head for a long time now. I've been sitting on these two chapters for long months, and I feel like if I don't post them now this AU will never see the light. 
> 
> The first two chapters are my way of setting up the exposition and the background; if I add any more to it, it will be as additional drabble-chapters to this fic.

1\. 

Jaime Lannister was born with the mark of a truth-teller on his left hand.

He knows, always, when a man is lying or shading the truth. More than a learned skill and practiced instinct, it’s his gift; falsehood tastes foul and bitter on his tongue. 

** 

It’s a dangerous, dangerous gift. 

Men have lived and died on a truth-teller’s word. Lords have risen and been torn down. 

Even kings have fallen.

**

When he was very young, no more than five or perhaps six years old, he had called his father on a lie in full view of the court at Casterly Rock. He can still remember the hushed silence that had followed his piping, innocent comment; he can still remember the incredulous rage in his father’s expression – 

His mother had found him, afterwards, weeping in shock and pain and disbelief at the beating his father had given him. 

“You must never, ever call your father a liar again, darling,” she had said, stroking his curls and holding him close against her. “Lords – especially great lords – cannot afford to have their authority undermined.”

“But he was lying, Mother,” Jaime had sobbed. “He said he had no knowledge of that lord’s death, but –”

“Hush,” his mother had said, “hush now, Jaime. A lord’s reputation is everything. Men live and die at his word. Wars are fought at his command. The bannermen and lords beneath him must follow him, or else all order and safety unravels.”

“But – it’s all built on a lie,” Jaime had said. 

“Lies keep the kingdoms together,” his mother had whispered in his ear. “It does no good to expose the truth.” 

** 

His father had tried to make him recant. 

Truth-tellers often did so before they came of age; it was an accepted practice for those born to noble houses. Most truth-tellers are of the small-folk; the backwoods villages and the hills are simple and straight-forward in their approach to justice. 

But Jaime had held firm, even in the face of his father’s furious punishment.

“Very well,” his father had said, “if you insist on this nonsense, then you must learn to think before you speak.” 

** 

For long, tedious weeks he had sat beside his father in the audience hall. 

“That man was lying,” he would say afterwards. 

“Yes, no doubt,” his father would say. “But _why_ was he lying?” 

And: “What consequences will follow if you expose him as a liar? What if he’s trying to protect someone? What if he’s a powerful lord, with armies at his back?”

**

Jaime never lies, but there are some truths that he does not speak and will not act on. 

Some truths are too dangerous to speak. There are some truths that queens and lords and even the meanest small-folk will kill to protect. 

The truth-teller’s conundrum is this: is this a truth worth dying for? Is this a truth worth killing for? 

Is this a truth worth plunging the realm into war?

**

Once, only once, had he taken the truth into his own hands. 

** 

2\. 

On the long, terrible journey from Riverrun to King’s Landing, Brienne had called him a liar. 

To a truth-teller, it was a worse accusation than kinslaying, or oath-breaking, or even the betrayal of guest-right. It undermined his very identity, threatened his integrity and his moral authority and if proven could see him torn apart by a screaming mob. And it had pricked him on the raw, because of all the things he had been and all the things he had done, he had never once told an untruth – 

“You withheld the truth, and allowed untruths to stand,” she had said, stubbornly. “You perpetuated the lie that rotted the kingdom from within. You tried to murder a young boy to protect that lie.”

He’d ignored her at first, but when she continued he turned on her furiously. “And what good would it do to tell the truth?” he had hissed. “If you were fucking your brother, would you shout it from the rooftops?” 

She had gone pale as curdled milk, and then had flushed furiously red. 

“Strangely enough,” he had continued, “no one ever asked me if I was fucking my sister. Had they done so, I would have owned it with pride – because I’m not, and I never have been a liar, you self-righteous cow.”

“And then you would have killed them,” she had guessed. 

“Yes,” he had answered. “I would have killed them. Because truth is dangerous, and it always, always has consequences.”

Ned Stark had been too honour-blind to think it through.

Before Robert’s death, Jaime had withheld two unspeakable truths: that he was fucking his sister the Queen, and that the Queen’s children were not the King’s. 

Now, though, the truths that could plunge the realm into war had been spoken into the world, the words reverberating and gaining a life all of their own, as truths did, and armies were marching, villages were burning, and men were dying, high lords and small folk alike. 

**

Some of the wilder and more fanatical of his truth-teller brethren had always condemned him for not exposing lies and falsehood wherever he found them. But most truth-tellers learn to exercise discretion; the truth is no protection against angry lords with swords and spears and hot pincers. 

In the Westerlands at least, where Lord Tywin Lannister casts a very long shadow, they understand the delicate line Jaime has learned to walk. The heir to Casterly Rock would never be allowed to roam the country-side as a wild-eyed itinerant truth-teller. 

The truth-teller’s vows call only for him to speak no word that is not true. Nothing more, and nothing less. 

That much, at least, he has done.


	2. Tyrion

When Tyrion was young, he and Jaime had played a game. 

They would sit in the gallery overlooking their father’s audience chamber and listen to some lord or other going on about something tedious – taxes, or trade, or accusing their neighbours of all sorts of sins – and Tyrion would try to guess whether the lord was lying or not. 

Sometimes it was easy. Other times, Tyrion couldn’t tell at all, and the only way he would ever know was by looking at Jaime, who would lift his finger fractionally for a lie. 

Jaime never made a face when people lied, like other travelling truth-tellers did. Sometimes he didn’t lift his finger at all, even if it was a lie. 

That was their father’s doing. 

**

There are many tales told about Jaime. 

They speak of his golden armour and his golden beauty; they speak of his murdering Aerys at the foot of the Iron Throne; they speak of his affair with Cersei with prurient fascination and they speak of the loss of his hand with cruel satisfaction. 

In the Westerlands, there is an even older tale: the truth-teller heir to Casterly Rock who refused to recant, even after Lord Tywin ordered him savagely beaten, even after Lord Tywin hanged the two old men who had been his mentors. 

The people of the Westerlands are often cruel and unforgiving. They like to test their truth-tellers to the breaking point. 

The entire court and household of the Rock – including Tyrion himself – had watched as crimson-cloaked guardsmen had seized Jaime and flogged him until he cried out, and then had thrown him to the ground before their father’s feet. 

“Recant,” their father had said. 

Jaime had struggled to his knees, bloodied and bruised, his eyes shocked and hurt. “No,” he had said. “No, I will not.” 

Their father had jerked his chin to the guards, who had seized Jaime and flogged him again until his back was welted and torn. Once more, the guards had thrown Jaime at their father’s feet. “Recant,” their father had said. “Speak one lie, Jaime, and it will be over.” 

Slowly, painfully, Jaime had lifted himself up and turned his head towards their father. His eyes had been filled with pain and anger. “No,” he had ground out once more, coughing and spitting blood into the dust. 

But their father had been determined that his heir would recant, and so a third time he had ordered Jaime flogged – this time, it had continued until blood ran slick down Jaime’s back, until Tyrion began to weep and Cersei cried out and Maester Creylen had begged their father to stop before any permanent injury was done. A third time their father had ordered Jaime to recant – 

A third time Jaime lifted his head, his eyes burning with terrible resolution. “No,” he had choked out.

There had been a general murmur of approval from the assembled watchers.

When Jaime had refused for a third time, their father had brought in the two old truth-tellers who had come to Casterly Rock to teach Jaime how to use his gift. 

“Recant,” their father had said, “or I will hang these men you care about so much.” 

Jaime had looked at their father, then, and had known his father was not lying. The Lord of Casterly Rock did not make empty threats.

“Hang them then,” Jaime had said, his voice empty. “I will not lie.” 

Their father gave the order, and the two men were strung up and hanged, and Jaime had watched every moment of it in terrible silence. 

Even now, the people of the Westerlands nod approvingly when they speak of young Lord Jaime’s testing. 

**

Perhaps their father had been proud. Perhaps he had thought to make use of his truth-teller son – in the audience chamber, or at the council table. 

But he had taught Jaime too well. Jaime was determined not to become a court lap-dog, standing by their father’s side and whispering “lie” or “truth” as men spoke.

Perhaps that was what their father had intended all along. 

** 

Still, sometimes Jaime will play the game with Tyrion again. 

**

By the time he arrives to a great conclave in the Dragonpit, Tyrion has gotten much better at identifying liars. 

Even so, he looks at Jaime when Euron Greyjoy speaks, not quite sure whether to believe such an over the top performance. 

Jaime, looking anywhere but at Tyrion, lifts his finger. 

When Cersei speaks Jaime doesn’t react, one way or the other. Jaime has never called Cersei on her lies, but not – quite – for the same reason as their father. 

When Jon Snow reveals that he has bent the knee to Daenerys, Tyrion looks to Jaime, incredulous – but Jaime only shrugs. 

Afterwards, the Dragon Queen fixes her fierce gaze on Tyrion. “Your brother is a truth-teller,” she says. 

“Yes,” he agrees gravely. 

“But he is not consistent in revealing truth and lies,” Daenerys says. 

“Jaime is not a puppet,” Tyrion says. “If Cersei had wanted an impartial truth teller to be present she would have arranged for one.”

“Then what use is he?” she asks. 

“Use?” Tyrion blinks at her. “He’s the lord of Casterly Rock, the commander of the Queen’s armies. He’s my brother. He doesn’t have to be of use.”


End file.
